View full sizeArchitect L. Craig Roberts' Mardi Gras slideshow includes historic photos, such as this one from the 1950 Maids of Mirth parade. (Courtesy of L. Craig Roberts)

MOBILE, Alabama – Learn a little history and perspective on Mobile Mardi Gras this Thursday, when architect and historian L. Craig Roberts will give a presentation at the Government Street lunch forum.

Roberts’ talk and slideshow on Jan. 23 will cover Carnival seasons past and present, with an insider’s view on the two main organizations and their traditions. “It’s very much the same set-up with each – very unlike New Orleans, by the way,” he said.

The Mobile Carnival Association and the Mobile Area Mardi Gras Association have similar rituals, Roberts said. Each group’s members include Mobile’s most prominent families – “the wealthiest and oldest black and white families in town,” he said – and each selects its own set of royalty: kings, queens, ladies and knights of the court, juvenile courts and so on.

The coronations are held on separate nights, Roberts said, and by tradition, each king and queen attends and is introduced at the other organization’s coronation. “That’s part of Mobile’s royalty celebration,” he said.

That Mobile’s two main Mardi Gras organizations are segregated shouldn’t be a big issue, Roberts said. “You can’t call something racist when everybody’s choosing to do it the way they do it.”

It’s also important to note, he said, that “most of what happens around Mardi Gras is a mixed conglomerate of people having a good time at balls and parades.” Mobile’s mystic societies offer something for everybody: gay and straight, marrieds and singles, men-only, women-only, he said. Also, the Conde Explorers are an integrated group.

Mardi Gras is “an all-inclusive event,” he said, and about 180,000 people attend the balls each year. “When you have 60 balls, it means that we have a huge community festival, and the second largest in the nation,” he said, only surpassed by New Orleans Mardi Gras.

Roberts, a graduate of Auburn University School of Architecture, has worked in Mobile for 33 years. He also volunteers downtown at the Mobile Carnival Museum at 355 Government St., giving tours.

The Government Street Forum is lunch and a speaker on Thursdays through April 17. The lunch and forum is held in the church’s Fellowship Hall at the Jackson Street entrance on Government and Jackson streets.

Lunch is served at noon and costs $7, which includes tea, coffee and dessert. There is no charge to attend the forum. For information, call the church office at 251-432-1749.